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Archive for September 30th, 2009

By Jeff Stein
Spy TalkWASHINGTON — The feds cracked Najibullah Zazi without laying a hand on him, according to most news accounts.

But some people still wonder if the rough stuff would have worked better — if only to make sure he gave it all up.

They’ve got to turn off their TVs.

Today I asked two veteran counterterrorism interrogators to take me inside the room when Zazi, the erstwhile New York street peddler- turned-alleged linchpin of a countrywide terrorist plot, was being questioned.

These guys — one from the FBI, and one an Air Force interrogator who mentally sparred with al Qaeda suspects in Iraq and Afghanistan — are the real deal. They’ve spent years eyeball-to-eyeball with hardcore terrorists and assorted other psychopaths, breaking them down.

Neither of them was in the room when the FBI cracked Zazi in Denver two weeks ago. But the techniques used to peel the 25-year-old Afghan immigrant like an avocado aren’t a mystery, either.

Robert Mueller III/fbi photo

You would never expect the FBI’s Robert Mueller to go before Congress and point fingers at the missteps of another law enforcement agency, that is unless things really really went wrong. In this case, some things may have gone wrong, but not wrong enough to air things in public.

By EILEEN SULLIVAN
Associated PressWASHINGTON – FBI Director Robert Mueller rejected suggestions Wednesday that poor coordination between the FBI and New York Police Department damaged the investigation of an Afghan immigrant charged with plotting a bomb attack in New York City.

Mueller also repeated previous assurances from federal and local officials that there is currently no known imminent threat to the U.S. from this case or any other.

Mueller testified before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs committee in the Obama administration’s first public appearance before lawmakers since news broke that Najibullah Zazi, a 24-year-old Denver airport driver, is suspected of plotting a terrorist attack in New York. Authorities have said Zazi admitted receiving explosives training from al-Qaida in Pakistan.

By Allan Lengel
ticklethewire.comWASHINGTON — The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) lacks coordination and is not doing nearly enough to crack down on the fraud involved in the distribution and sales of tobacco that amounts to more $5 billion in lost U.S. taxes a year and is sometimes linked to terrorism and organized crime, according to a report by the Justice Department’s Office of Inspector General.

“ATF has placed a lower priority on its alcohol and tobacco diversion mission area compared with other mission areas involving firearms, arson and explosives,” the report said.

“We found that ATF’s diversion efforts are ad hoc , that ATF personnel we interviewed lacked a clear understanding of the scope of diversion activity across field divisions, and that ATF headquarters does not adequately support the field divisions’ diversion investigations.”

“In addition, we found that no systematic method exists to share intelligence or information specifically about diversion between the field and headquarters, which adds to ATF’s lack of knowledge of the overall level of diversion activity in the nation.”

By Allan Lengel
ticklethewire.comWASHINGTON — Arthur Folsom, the Denver sole practitioner representing terrorist suspect Najibullah Zazi, is turning to the college set for help, the Wall Street Journal Law Blog reports.

Folsom, who has been criticized by some for being in over his head on this case, has placed an ad with the University of Denver Law School’s career development center for an “intern position for a current law student”, the Journal reported.

The “main responsibilities will be conducting research for a federal terrorism case.” The ad calls for “good research skills” and says experience on the federal level is preferred, the Journal reported.

The highly sophisticated detector equipment along the border isn’t all that sophisticated, just expensive. The Boeing Co. is getting another chance to make it right. But how much more will that cost?

By Oscar Avila
Chicago Tribune
Along the boundary between Arizona and Mexico recently, Border Patrol agent Michael Scioli weaved his SUV through unforgiving rock formations and hills of desert brush. Illegal immigrants covertly were crossing the border nearby, but Scioli’s agency doesn’t always have the manpower to know exactly where.

Scioli then passed a 98-foot-tall tower fitted with cameras, a high-tech extra set of eyes that he and other agents presumably would welcome. “Don’t have much to say about that,” the agent said tersely.

The tower is part of a network of cameras and sensors rolled out with great fanfare by Chicago-based Boeing Co. three years ago but now is largely disowned by Border Patrol agents and lambasted by lawmakers and government watchdogs.

The so-called virtual fence, which has received $500 million from the Department of Homeland Security, should have been fully in place already in southern Arizona. Instead, the department scrapped the first attempt, which cost Boeing at least $40 million in overruns.

Edwin Foltz took an interesting career path, serving as an FBI agent during World War II before he eventually headed up Campbell Soup.

By Sally A. Downey
Philadelphia InquirerPHILADELPHIA — Edwin J. Foltz, 93, a former FBI agent who became president of Campbell Soup International, died of pneumonia Thursday at Waverly Heights, a retirement community in Gladwyne.

Mr. Foltz joined Campbell Soup Co.in Camden in 1953. He was named vice president of personnel in 1958 and two years later became head of the company’s operations in Australia, Europe, and Mexico.

His daughter, Dorothy Foltz-Gray, said that when she and her siblings were growing up, they would ask him what he did at Campbell’s. “He would tell us he stirred the soup,” Foltz-Gray said, “and we wondered why he wore a suit and tie to work.” Even in his final illness he was quipping, “M’mm, m’mm good,” when he sipped soup, she said.